the dining room fixture in my dining room was fine. it worked. but it was dated and not my style. with a little spray paint and some paper i gave the chandelier a little update.
before i did anything, i removed the lightbulbs and glass covers, cleaned the chandelier and taped up the sockets. using tape and paper, i created a tent around the fixture to protect the ceiling and walls.

the chandelier was sprayed with a couple of coats of black spray paint. between coats i worked on the paper lampshades.

i printed a few sheets of my little pine forest pattern with a light grey background. in the spring i’m planning on switching the design with the yellow lemons from this years calendar. they will go great with my yellow countertops.

you don’t have to print your own paper for the shades, though. you can use gift wrap, scrapbook paper or anything else that suits your mood. i cut the paper to be about and inch and a half taller than the glass shades and long enough to wrap around the glass cover twice. i scored the paper every 1/2 inch. the paper was then accordion folded.

if the paper you choose doesn’t make it around twice, you can easily use double sided tape to put two lengths together.

to create the shades the ends of the paper were taped together and tiny holes were punched about an inch down from the top on the center of each fold. twine was then fed through each hole. some cute ribbon would add a nice touch here.after the paint was dry, the final step was to put everything together. the tape was removed and the glass covers and bulbs were put back on. the shades were slipped over the glass covers and the twine was tightened a bit and knotted. the top needs to be a little bit smaller than the bottom so the shades won’t slid off.

i am pretty happy with my new and improved chandelier. and when i get tired of it, i can easily switch out the shades to anything i want.